As a coalition of East Bay hills residents, we are opposed to the FEMA funded deforestation plan due to it numerous and multifaceted threats. In addition to increasing the risk of another devastating fire, the deforestation/poisoning plan will also expose citizens to large amounts of dangerous chemicals (including school children), exacerbate climate change by releasing 17,495 metric tons of greenhouse gases into our environment, poison, displace and kill wildlife (including several protected species), radically alter the appearance and therefore the experience afforded by our public recreation areas, threaten homeowners values by degrading the aesthetics upon which those values depend, eliminate erosion control for hillside homes, result in (according to FEMA) “significant alternation of community character,” and a variety of other harms “to vegetation, wildlife and habitats, protected species, soils, water quality, aesthetics, community character, human health and safety, recreation, and noise” that FEMA admits are “unavoidable.”